President Donald Trump wants New Mexico to change its name to New America, but why does the state have that name, and how has it remained unchanged for more than 170 years?
New Mexico was a territory that was part of the Spanish Empire and later Mexico following its independence in 1821. Spain gave it its name after exploring the region and finding lands they considered as valuable as those of Tenochtitlán, according to information compiled by National Geographic.
When Mexico lost the war against the United States in 1848 and ceded 55 percent of its territory under the Treaty of Guadalupe Hidalgo, New Mexico came under U.S. control.
However, it was a territory that was looked down upon for years, and there were several attempts to change its name.
The New Mexico Museum of Art explained that the acquisition of the territory brought new “foreigners” and problems with them, leading some representatives to suggest that annexing the territory had been a “bad deal.”
Some even argued that the United States should force Mexico to take the territory back because of its arid climate and the people with Indigenous traditions.
Communities spent decades trying to obtain statehood, which also led to problems involving education and land and water rights under a military regime. It was not until 1912 that New Mexico was recognized as a state.
The times they tried to change New Mexico’s name
After being granted territorial status in 1850, the United States Congress referred to the territory as New Mexico, and years later it attempted to change the name with the goal of breaking any connection between its people and Mexico, according to the University of New Mexico.
The first proposals were Jefferson and Lincoln, but only the first U.S. president, Washington, had been honored in the United States with a state named after him.
Two other proposals were taken from Indigenous peoples: Montezuma, which was rejected by Congress, and Acoma, which was rejected by influential members of the House of Representatives, including Bernard S. Rodey, the territorial delegate.
Finally, because the territory had been occupied by Spain, names such as Salado and Cordillera were considered, but they did not receive serious support in Congress.
In 1906, there was even a proposal for it to become part of a joint state with what is now Arizona, after Congress approved a law by President Theodore Roosevelt to merge the two territories in 1906.
For four years, an attempt was made to unify the two territories; however, New Mexicans rejected the proposal, while Arizona also opposed it.
The lack of support for new names and the rejection of unification with Arizona resulted in the name remaining New Mexico, a state that refuses to change its name, despite attempts by Donald Trump, following the change of the name of Lake Ontario to the “Lake of America.”
Source: elfinanciero
